


The Simplicity of Decay

by obfuscatress



Category: Wooden Overcoats
Genre: M/M, discussion of hypothermia like it’s something one ought to flirt about, is it bad I find this a genuinely appealing date idea?, literal corpse jokes, people say and do strange things when they're tired and cold, sort of inappropriate conduct for a morgue
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-25
Updated: 2016-08-25
Packaged: 2018-08-10 10:31:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,164
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7841341
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/obfuscatress/pseuds/obfuscatress
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Rudyard, being Rudyard, accidentally gets himself and Eric Chapman stuck in a morgue overnight. It wouldn’t all be terrible, if only he could feel his toes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Simplicity of Decay

**Author's Note:**

> I blame this all on ThatgirlnamedEleanor, who introduced me to this podcast and subsequently dragged me into fandom hell. Not that I wasn't ready to sin all on my own.

Rudyard has simply had enough. Doing his daily round through the village to visit all the people that seem likely to drop dead in the near future - men over seventy, women over seventy five, the butcher who recently chopped off a fourth finger and broke a leg slipping on his own blood, anyone permanently admitted to the local hospital, and Jeremy Keith, the not so anonymous and slightly self destructive village arsonist - Rudyard Funn has discovered he’s lost two prospective clients to Eric bloody Chapman, again. Worst of all, this time he’d been certain he’d almost bagged them. He even smiled at old Mrs Stanley the other day.

Maybe that had been his fatal mistake, Rudyard muses. If he looked anything like Antigone did when she attempted friendliness, he could most certainly ascribe the loss to that. He returns to his shop where Georgie is still filing her nails behind the counter like he never left at all and for the progress he’s made it might as well be case.

“Any clients today?” he asks, not really wanting to hear an answer.

Georgie only shakes her head. “No, sir. But I hear no one’s died either, so there wasn’t all that much business to expect anyway.”

“What about Chapman’s?”

“There’s been a couple odd scallywags floatin’ in and out,” she says, “But then he’s runnin’ that cafe these days, so you never really know if they go in for a cappuccino or a funeral.”

“Yes... yes indeed.” Rudyard chews thoughtfully on his lower lip and wonders if they oughtn’t  expand their shop as well. Maybe the clients would come visit him instead of the other way around. He could reel them in right from his doorstep and then if they made a _real_ profit-

“Mr Funn?”

“Sorry, did you say something?”

“I asked if you had any luck at the retirement home.”

“No, not today, Georgie,” Rudyard sighs.

“Better luck next time, sir,” Georgie says and packs up her things for the day. Rudyard doesn’t pay her any mind until she’s already halfway out the door and asks, “Oh, can I come in a little late tomorrow? Nana’s got a doctor’s appointment and she needs someone to go with her.”

“Tomorrow? But we’ve got to conduct the Bosworth funeral at ten.”

“About that,” Georgie says, and Rudyard is not pleased in the slightest with the way her face twists, “Lady Forge came in earlier. They’re doing it with Eric Chapman, after all.”

“What? They can’t do that. Antigone’s already embalmed her. We’ve booked the church. I even got _flowers_. I hate flowers.”

“Yes, well, Antigone’s drained her again and Eric picked up the body half an hour ago,” Georgie says, not seeming the slightest bit concerned by how fast business is dwindling for them.

“And what am I supposed to do with the flowers then?” Rudyard asks. “Sodding, stupid Eric Chapman. Always ruining everything.”

“Maybe he could buy your flowers. He did ask me whether we still needed the violets, but I said I didn’t know.”

“He tried to buy the flowers meant for our funeral that he also stole?”

“Well, yeah. It’d seem so.”

“Right, that does it. I am going to go over there right this instant and tell Chapman he can stick his manipulative little act of kindness somewhere… somewhere… ugh, Christ, where is Antigone when you need her?”

“Probably at the cinema, sir.”

Rudyard stops in the doorway. “The cinema?”

“It’s a Thursday. She always goes to the cinema on Thursdays.”

“Since when?” Rudyard asks, then remembers he’s on a mission that definitely doesn’t involve dissecting his sister’s social life. “Nevermind that now, I’ve got to got tell Chapman to sod off and stop stealing our clients. You lock up here, Georgie.”

“Wait,” she yells after Rudyard, who’s already dashed halfway across the square, “what about tomorrow mornin’?”

“Come in as late as you want. It’s not like we’ve got anything to do without a funeral,” Rudyard shouts back.

 

* * *

 

Across the square from Funn Funerals, Eric Chapman is just closing shop after a long day of organising Miss Bosworth’s funeral for the coming Saturday, when Rudyard bursts through the door looking like a rabid rhinoceros ready to batter someone.

“Chapman!”

“Rudyard?”

“How dare you?” Rudyard roars, “I go out to make an honest living, _walking_ all day, while you sit here and prey on my shop.”

“Rudyard, I honestly don’t know what you’re talking about,” Chapman says with a nervous laugh. He looks stunned enough to convince anyone else, but Rudyard isn’t going to be fooled.

Instead, he stalks toward the door Chapman is about to lock. “Is this where you keep them all, the bodies you steal?”

“Steal? Rudyard what are you on about?”

Eric Chapman’s amused smile dissolves into confusion and Rudyard mutters something under his breath, walking straight into Chapman’s morgue without actually paying the man any mind.

“You can’t go down there,” Chapman yells from the top step, still holding the door.

“I can go anywhere I bloody well please,” he shouts, “and you’re coming with me.”

Catching Eric Chapman off guard, Rudyard pulls him into the morgue with him, nearly tripping Chapman on the stairs and causing them both to tumble down the stairs. Behind them, the door slams shut, and Chapman’s panicked expression slowly turns furious while Rudyard continues to mutter about body theft.

“Rudyard,” Chapman tries to say, but decides it isn’t worth the effort.

As many other inhabitants of Piffling Vale have discovered previously, Eric Chapman comes to the conclusion it would be best to simply let Rudyard wear himself out, shouting things like _‘This is the last straw!_ ’ and _‘I’ll have you know, I won’t stand for this!_ ’ as he paces the room. Chapman watches his neighbour and competitor for a good few minutes before the man seems to slow down even one bit. Eventually, Rudyard comes to a halt, although it is only to take a second look at the sheet covered body between them.

“Wait a minute, is that Miss Bosworth?” Rudyard asks, recognising the body, or rather the feet, as familiar. The hideous case of ringworm is really more than enough to distinguish the late Miss Bosworth. At least it’s all Antigone’s been going on about for three whole days.

Chapman glances at the body, then Rudyard. “Yes, that is her.”

“You mean, the same Miss Bosworth that Antigone embalmed yesterday? Whom she had to drain fourteen hours after she was done because Miss Bosworth’s lesbian lover of forty-three years decided she liked you more?”

“Well, I don’t know anything about that,” Chapman starts, “I was approached by Lady Forge the other day and I wasn’t going to deny her a funeral service.”

“ _I_ was already providing her with a funeral service!”

“Rudyard-”

“No, this is it. I am leaving!” He stalks up the stairs, grumbling a hushed ‘God he’s infuriating!’ under his breath that isn’t quite quiet enough to escape Eric Chapman.

Pushing on the door, Rudyard soon finds it doesn’t budge an inch. He tries again and this time puts his back into it in as dignified a manner as possible with Chapman still standing at the foot of the stairs, no doubt waiting for him to fail.

“Rudyard…”

“Is there a button somewhere?” he asks, sliding his hands over the door in case he’s gone blind somehow. “Whoops, that was the lightswitch. Sorry.”

As the lights come back on, Chapman crosses his arms and says: “Rudyard, if you’d listen for a minute, I could tell you we’re stuck in here.”

Rudyard whirls around. “What do you mean ‘stuck in here’?”

“I didn’t think that was an ambiguous statement,” Chapman mutters to himself. “Anyway, what I was saying is that we can’t get out, because that door is sealed by an electronic lock and you, ever so conveniently, knocked the key out of my hand dragging me down here. So for all intents and purposes, we are stuck in the mortuary now, Rudyard.”

“But that’s impossible! I mean, what kind of morgue is locked from the inside? That would simply be _terrible_ planning,” Rudyard says and laughs.

Eric Chapman still doesn’t look amused. In fact, his expression resembles that of Georgie when she’s trying to fight off his advances and Rudyard swallows thickly with realisation finally dawning on him.

“You mean, we’re really…”

“Yes, Rudyard.”

“Huh. Fancy that.” Sobering up, Rudyard sticks his hands into his pockets and has the decency to at least look sheepish. He isn’t going to apologise, they both know that, so it’ll have to do.

Eventually Eric Chapman sighs in resignation. He unfolds his arms and lets them fall to his sides, a gesture Rudyard takes as an acceptance of his non-verbal apology. “Looks like we’ll be spending the night here.”

“What?” Rudyard asks, thinking rather about the implication of the phrase ‘spending the night’ than the context of the situation. Realising his mistake, he coughs and adds, “Surely we’ll get out before that.”

“Not unless my embalmer missed her ferry to the mainland.”

“You have an embalmer from the mainland?” Rudyard asks, sounding incredulous.

“Yes, I do, Rudyard. There was hardly another one on the island besides your sister and I don’t have time to do everything myself. I am only one man.”

“It’s just… Piffling Vale doesn’t get embalmers from the mainland,” Rudyard says carefully. This is a truth that’s been upheld for five centuries as long as the Funns have been in the business. Then again, they used to own the only funeral home on the island. They don’t anymore.

Eric Chapman is still looking at him like he is exceptionally dense and Rudyard huffs: “I suppose things have changed.”

“Yes, I’m glad you’ve noticed this isn’t the 16th century anymore,” Chapman says under his breath, not knowing Rudyard’s developed his lip reading to near perfection in his eighteen years alone with Antigone.

“There’s no need to be sarcastic,” Rudyard tells him. “I’ll just call Antigone to get us out of here. It won’t even take a minute. She’s right across the street and your key is practically right in front of the door, isn’t it?”

“Yes, but-” Chapman’s reply is cut off by Rudyard lifting a finger to shush him while he’s on the phone. “Rudyard, there’s no service down here.”

“No service?”

“No.”

A few months ago that would have hardly been a surprise, what with the only mobile coverage being in Reverend Wavering’s bathroom. Since then, however, Mayor Desmond Desmond has paid for the expansion of the network, primarily because towns have 3G roaming these days and less so because Agatha Doyle was convinced it would decrease crime rate. What she had failed to overlook was that there was no police department to report crime to in the first place.

Not that, if there were one, Rudyard could call them for help either. As it turns out, Chapman’s morgue is a repurposed former, fortified bunker basement. That in itself is bad enough, but with the additional insulation, coolant tubing, and metal plates to give it all a shiny finishing touch - and he’s really starting to see where Antigone is coming from with that talk about replacing the old tile walls - the case is hopeless.

“Why don’t you have a phone down here?” Rudyard asks accusingly once Eric Chapman is done explaining why they are very much trapped and that he is not kidding in saying they are going to have to stay the entire night. “Antigone has a phone in her mortuary. Although, come to think of it, that’s only because she doesn’t want people going down there. That… actually that explains a lot of things.”

Having forgotten about Chapman as Rudyard tends to forget about people in his presence in general, he startles when the man asks, “Do you see now why I said you can’t just come down here?”

Rudyard, loathe to admit to any fault, particularly in the presence of Eric Chapman, merely says, “I didn’t drop the key, so this isn’t actually my fault. And you should really consider putting up a ‘warning: self-locking’ sign on the door in case someone accidentally stumbles down here.”

“Who would accidentally stumble into my mortuary?”

“Well, there’s me for starters… and you. That’s two people already. Quite high a rate on an island of this size.”

“Alright, I’ll think about putting up a sign,” Chapman concedes.

Satisfied with that, Rudyard tries rattling the door again just in case someone would hear. Meanwhile, Eric Chapman sits down. “It’s no use.”

“I’ve not given up so far, and I’m not about to now,” Rudyard says. He has another thought, but its verbalisation falls short when he turns to see Chapman at the bottom of the stairs. “What are you doing?”

“Sitting down? Or do you expect me to stand for the next fourteen hours?”

“No, but I was going to sit on the stairs,” he says and they blink at each other in confusion.

As per usual, Eric Chapman is the one to clear things up, for Rudyard never seems to understand that is an actual possibility in life. “I’m sorry, but I don’t... see the problem here. There are plenty of steps to sit on. I can move, if you want to sit on this step.”

“I don’t want your _step_ ,” Rudyard scoffs. “In fact, I don’t want the staircase either, now that you’re sitting on it. We’re rivals, Chapman. We can’t just sit on the same staircase. What sort of business would that be?”

He is already down the stairs by the time Chapman sighs.

“Rudyard, this is getting ridiculous. You do realise I’m not trying to steal your business and that this isn’t some elaborate plan to trap you for... whatever reason it is you may think I have for trapping you. Because there is none.”

“Well, obviously you’re not trying to trap me in your mortuary ¬”

“Good. I’m glad you see that.”

“¬ but half the bodies here used to be mine, so I beg to differ on that business part. I mean, the whole bloody room reeks of Antigone’s cinnamon embalming fluid.”

“Is that what that smell is? Anyway, listen. Of course I have to make sure I have funerals to run, but I respect people’s personal choices in the matter. Yes, I’ve been talking to many of the elderly people on the island to recommend my funeral home over yours,” Eric Chapman says and here Rudyard gives a furious sniff, “which is my right, as a business owner like yourself. But, and I want to make this very clear now once and for all, I have not attempted, nor will I ever attempt, to change a client’s mind on their service provider, once they’ve made a choice. So, if you are losing bodies, that is not my fault. For example, Miss Bosworth was transferred because Lady Forge didn’t like your constant attempts to dissuade her from putting violets in the floral arrangement on the coffin.”

“Yes, but that was rather obvious.”

“Rudyard, they were a rather obvious couple for decades. I’ve only been here for a few months and even I knew.”

“Isn’t that just fantastic then? If you knew them so well, why don’t you arrange the funeral?”

“I… am?”

“Right-o.” He is once again surprised at having backed himself into a corner both literally and figuratively. It seems to be happening an awful lot since Eric Chapman’s arrival. Rudyard refuses to give it any thought and grabs the one and only chair in the room.

“Oh for the love of God, what is it you’re doing now?” Chapman asks, when Rudyard drags the chair across the floor to the opposite end of the room.

“Sitting as far away from you as possible.”

Chapman considers replying to that, but decides not to. At this point, or perhaps really any given point in time, reasoning with Rudyard seems pointless, and so they end up sitting in silence at opposite ends of the morgue.

 

* * *

 

Their mutual determination not to talk to one another lasts for a surprisingly long time – 86 minutes, if Rudyard’s occasional murmuring of half-words doesn’t count. In the end, neither of them makes the initiative to engage the other, but the inhuman growl of Chapman’s stomach in the quiet morgue warrants comment, if only because they have nothing else to do at all.

“Did that sound come from you?” Rudyard asks, seeming at once frightened and smug to have outlasted Eric Chapman in an unspoken contest.

“I’m afraid so; it is only the two of us down here.”

“Yes, but you know the corpses sometimes make sounds. – Or at least that is what Antigone tells me. I’m not actually allowed in the morgue.”

Not wanting to discuss corpses or Rudyard’s sister, Chapman says, “Well, you can rest assured it was me and not a body, Rudyard. I was going to go have dinner before you stormed in earlier. Hopefully you’ve eaten at least, because this is going to take a while.”

At another time Chapman might’ve taken offence at the way Rudyard seems to drop conversations on a moment's whim as though he wasn’t having a conversation at all, but rather a têtê-a-têtê with his impression of another person, but at the time being he is too hungry to consider anything other than the possibility of food. Rudyard shifts his feet and his shoes make a horrid sound against the linoleum floor that has Chapman jump up from his seat.

“I should start stocking a box of snacks down here,” he says, “the dry goods from the cafe really would keep well in the cool. Of course, contamination might be an issue. I doubt Helen - the embalmer, that is - keeps anything here either.”

Rudyard glances up at Chapman to where he’s pacing, tempted to jokingly ask ’What about the bodies?’, but then he might end up being the strange one, because people generally seem to miss his attempts at humor. Rudyard reminds himself that is why he doesn’t do jokes. Instead he looks away and mutters, “Food isn’t the only problem. It’s bloody frigid down here.”

“It does rather help in keeping the bodies cold, I understand,” Chapman says sarcastically, “Though it does no good to the electricity bill.”

Rudyard hums because he understands the problem all too well. Chapman, though, has nothing to worry about. With business booming he probably doesn’t even have to think about all the bills he has to pay, unlike Rudyard, which Antigone won’t ever shut up about. He frowns at the thought of Antigone. She would probably murder him if she knew her dream morgue lies in Eric Chapman’s basement.

“Nothing in here,” Chapman says and Rudyard snaps out of his own thoughts to find Chapman at his embalmer’s desk with all the drawers pulled open and the boxes upturned on the table. If office supplies are what he’s found, Rudyard guesses it’s food he is looking for.

“What about that storage unit?” he asks, pointing at what looks like a prop janitor’s closet from a movie.

“Storage unit? Oh, no, that’s Helen’s locker-” Chapman’s face suddenly lights up with an idea, an expression that unnerves Rudyard because it normally means terrible things for business. At the time it is anything but. “Rudyard, that is a brilliant idea!”

“It is? I mean, of course it is. Care to elaborate what exactly I said?” Rudyard asks when Chapman rattles at the locker door.

Ignoring Rudyard, Chapman says, “Give me hand, will ya?”

“Me?”

“No, Rudyard, I was talking to Miss Bosworth – Of course I mean you!” Rudyard makes a face behind Chapman’s back. ”Hand me the fire extinguisher, please.”

Not wanting to make a fool of himself again, and perhaps reluctantly acknowledging that Eric Chapman tends to have functional plans from time to time, Rudyard gets to his feet and unstraps the fire extinguisher from the wall next to him. Really, he’s quite displeased by this turn of events, since Rudyard planned on sleeping against it later.

For now, he grunts dragging the heavy bottle over to Chapman, who picks it up with ease, much to Rudyard’s annoyance. ”So, what now?” Rudyard asks, though he finds his answer almost immediately when Chapman smashes the fire extinguisher into the door.

“What the _hell_ , Chapman?” he yells over the sound of a second bang, clasping his hands over his ears.

“That ought to do it, don’t you think?” Chapman asks in return instead of answering the question.

Rudyard still doesn’t have a clue what ’it’ is, but all of a sudden his hands are full of slightly dinged up fire extinguisher again and that’s enough to deal with at once. He is fairly certain damaging a tank full of liquid carbon dioxide counts as a bad idea, though compared to the smashed in door, the tank isn’t much worse for wear. For some inconceivable reason, Chapman is grinning from ear to ear prying the door open and- _Oh._

“There’s a coat in here! And a jumper,” he says.

So, that is what he’d been trying to do all along, Rudyard thinks and pushes away the thought that he truly is incredibly dense. “What did you smash the door in for?”

Chapman, still cheerfull as ever, says, “Well, it seems clothes and… a handful of biscuits.” His smile falters when he turns to see Rudyard glowering at him from behind, fire extinguisher still cradled in his arms. “Are you… upset - about the door?”

“No,” Rudyard lies, badly. He sets the tank down and mutters: ”I could have picked the lock, is all.”

“Oh,” Chapman says, eyes widening. And there is that hint of surprise again, that tell tale sign of having been underestimated yet again, that Rudyard despises so. “I didn’t know that.”

“Evidently.”

“Yes, well, it’s only a door in the end,” Chapman says and lifts the banged up piece of metal off its hinges to set it against the wall. He clears his throat and casts an apologetic look in Rudyard’s way before he returns to the bounty of the closet.

Rudyard, although curious, stays back and leans against the wall by the former door. Glancing at the clock on the opposite wall, he realises his resolve to stay as far as humanly possible from Eric Chapman has lasted him a sodding ninety minutes and has now pushed them into a one metre radius. Still, it isn’t all terrible, he decides, when Chapman turns to offer him a ratty old jumper that looks like it might help revive his blood drained extremities.

“Are you sure?” Rudyard asks, burying his fingers in the soft fabric. “Your embalmer won’t mind, that is.”

“Rudyard, you came here without a jacket and, by the looks of it, you aren’t even wearing a vest under that shirt,” Chapman says and the way his eyes flick down mortifies Rudyard. So what if it is a little cold and his body’s reacted in the way bodies do? “Considering I’m dressed in three layers, it’s only fair.”

“Fine,” Rudyard concedes. He pulls the slightly too small jumper over his head so fast he gets it all rolled up on itself, struggling to tug it out of its own folds. He’s even more self conscious about Eric Chapman watching him than before, struggling in a woolen mess. To divert Chapman’s attention from the human disaster he is, Rudyard says, “Should we see about those biscuits?”

“Oh, yes!” He goes back to pulling a half eaten pack of broken digestives. “We have a total of six.”

“Three each then.”

“Not much in the way of dinner. I was going to have Mexican tonight, but I suppose this will do.”

Chapman’s mouth twitches into a lopsided smile as he offers Rudyard his share of the biscuits, and Rudyard finds he is genuinely sorry for thrusting Chapman’s plans into ruin. All Rudyard had in store was dinner à la Antigone, which meant oven cooked beetroots. Perhaps they still had the odd potato or two in the fridge, but his evening was going to be bleak enough to not be ruined by the prospective of Digestives for tea.

He nibbles on the biscuits thoughtfully, Eric Chapman leaning against the edge of the desk to eat his. It occurs to Rudyard he’s never been in such close proximity to Chapman for this long, if one doesn’t count the time he’d reluctantly been rescued onto Eric Chapman’s yacht, but that had involved another dozen people and some very frigid toes distracting him from anything Chapman might’ve said. In one way the morgue is much like the sea, because he can’t feel in his toes now either.

“Having important revelations?” Chapman asks.

“Huh? No,” Rudyard says and shoves the second biscuit in his mouth in two big bites. He’s on the third one, Chapman still staring at him, evidently waiting for him to make the next move, when Rudyard asks, “Was there anything else in the locker?”

“Not really, no. Just an umbrella and a coat. You should actually take that; it looks quite warm.”

Not paying proper attention to what Chapman is saying Rudyard mutters: “Shouldn’t we share that too?”

“There’s only one coat. We can hardly share it,” Chapman says and Rudyard realises his mistake.

Not only that, but he has to agree Chapman does have a point there. They can’t rip it in half, after all. Although, it is a large overcoat. Perhaps they could- No, no they definitely can’t. “You’re right. We’ll simply have to take turns.”

“You go first then.” Chapman says and throws Rudyard the coat where he’s sitting on the floor with the dinged up fire extinguisher.

Rudyard is about to put it on, when it crosses his mind this may be some kind of trick. He’s already got the jumper. “Actually, you take it first.”

“What, why?”

He can’t exactly admit he doesn’t want to let Eric Chapman get away with being the annoyingly nice one in the situation they currently find themselves in, especially since it is maybe a little bit Rudyard’s fault they’re there in the first place. What he says is: “It’s your coat, sort of.”

“Rudyard, that doesn’t matter. I don’t need it; you’re the one who’s cold.”

“I’m not cold.”

“You _just_ said you were cold.”

“I said it was chilly in the morgue. Besides, I’m not cold anymore.”

“So, you were cold a minute ago then?”

“What? No,” Rudyard shouts, a flash of irrational anger bubbling up at the thought of being found out. “Look, just take the coat.” He throws it at Chapman, but falls miserably short in the toss. The coat lands halfway across the morgue, sprawled sadly on the floor heating neither one of them.

 _Are we just gonna sit here staring then_ , Rudyard thinks and turns his head to read the label on the fire extinguisher. It reminds him of the times him and Antigone used to sit in the morgue on weekends while their mother worked, Antigone always prodding at the bodies while Rudyard spun around in a chair dying of boredom reciting the instruction on the fire blanket in a quiet murmur. Strange to think nothing in his life has experience significant change apart from Eric Chapman’s arrival on the island.

With his mind engrossed in Piffling Vale twenty-five years ago and his tongue digging bits of pasty digestives out of his molars, Rudyard doesn’t notice half the lights in the morgue going off. Chapman says something, though Rudyard doesn’t hear, his eyes flicking lazily in the other man’s direction. He supposes catching any sleep is a blessing, even if he’s going to wake up with rigor mortis setting in in his neck.

 

* * *

 

When Rudyard does wake, it is as much to a stiff neck as a strange warmth enveloping him. He hums and burrows further into it, his body slowly materialising in the world. His back is cool, thighs numb, but his hands and arms rest languidly in his lap. Realising he can feel neither his toes nor his nose, Rudyard has the thought he might be freezing to death and that any semblance of comfort is merely a trick of the mind. He jolts to consciousness and upright where he’s huddled up on the floor, less upright than lying down by now. The movement causes him to knock over the fire extinguisher with a loud clang that echoes sharply in the empty room.

Rudyard scrambles for the tank, the coat placed over him falling into his lap – and, ah, that would explain a thing or two –,  but it’s already too late. On the stairs, Chapman startles, also having dozed off at some point after Rudyard.

“Wha’s happnin’?” he asks in a panic, hands reaching for anything in sight and landing on the railing.

“Sorry,” Rudyard whispers, voice hoarse from sleep, “I sort of... knocked into... that.”

Chapman blinks at him stupidly for a few moments before he says, “That’s alright,” and breaks into a jaw splitting yawn.

It’s half eleven by now, Rudyard notes with a glance at the clock, or - in other words - too late for anyone to move a finger toward getting them out even if his phone did magically decide to work in their little insulated freezer box for a change.

Chapman opens and closes his fists to pump some blood into his fingers while Rudyard wiggles his toes, both slowly coming to terms with consciousness. On the table between them, Miss Bosworth’s stiff digits hang over the edge and Rudyard notes his own plump, pink fingers still tingle from the warmth of the coat.

Eric Chapman must have placed it over him when he fell asleep, he realises. The thought confounds Rudyard, because he wouldn’t have done the same were their roles reversed. No, Rudyard would have quietly crawled for it and gotten cosy, and so the idea that anyone else might care enough to consider him first is utterly alien, especially when he can so clearly see the discomfort it’s caused Chapman as a result. He gets up to stretch, pacing around, and Rudyard follows him with his gaze, grinding his fingers into the knots in his own neck.

“Sleep well?” Chapman asks, and Rudyard shrugs.

In this lazy, sleep ridden moment, latching on to the well of contempt he’s harboured for Chapman for months seems impossible, Rudyard’s whole world narrowing to the press of his fingers in his flesh and the sound of Eric Chapman’s perfectly polished shoes going _click clack_ , echoing in the morgue.

Reluctantly, Rudyard gets up and stretches his slack limbs. It’s a goodbye to sleep and with it his coat. He holds it out to Chapman. “Your turn.”

“Are you sure?” Of course the git would have to be overly polite.

“Yes, you’re bloody freezing and I’ve just had it for two hours.”

He shoves the coat impatiently at Chapman, who takes it from him with a quiet ‘thank you’ before he slips his arms into what is left of Rudyard’s body heat trapped in the fabric. Unlike Rudyard, he gets dressed in it properly: buttons done up, collar popped, and his hands buried deep in the pockets.

It’s still huge on Chapman, probably having belonged to some sturdy man decades ago before it’d ended up in Chapman’s morgue through Helen the embalmer from the mainland. Thinking of it now, it seems like the sort of coat two kids would get under to pretend they’re a single adult, not that Rudyard’s ever witnessed an incident like that anywhere else than on telly.

If only they had something ridiculous like that to watch now, he thinks, wishing Eric Chapman’s morgue were equipped with the same comically small antenna TV Antigone keeps in hers for the afternoon soap operas she enjoys in a multitude of languages. At the moment, even a radio would be a good start.

“What do we do now?” Rudyard asks.

Chapman is still flexing his fingers in the coat pockets. “We can’t sleep, not without a coat each, unless you fancy a case of hypothermia.

Rudyard snorts and makes a face, used to displaying all emotion openly on his face. Chapman’s smile in response is new though.

“I’m afraid I didn’t bring any board games with me, so I guess that leaves us with talking,” Chapman says cheerfully, “Any fun childhood mishaps you’d like to share? Ever gotten stuck in a morgue before?”

“Not accidentally,” Rudyard says matter of factly, completely missing the cheek in tongue tone of the question.

Chapman raises his eyebrows, saying, “Didn’t think this was a story I would want to hear, but go on.”

“There isn’t a story exactly. Just me stealing Antigone’s juice box god knows how many years ago. Mummy was out and she locked me in the morgue as revenge. We weren’t really supposed to be down there alone, you see.” Chapman laughs and Rudyard frowns, because he doesn’t find the incident funny. He’d only been five years old and bloody terrified to be left alone with four corpses. There was the other matter too. He whispers, “I didn’t know bodies made sounds back then,” cheeks flushing, because the initial horror of that discovery has faded into mortification over the years.

“Oh God, that at must’ve- Sorry, I didn’t mean to laugh-  Must’ve been awful at the time, but the image of you and Antigone as kids-” He coughs in a terrible attempt to hide a giggle. Rudyard isn’t sure whether to be smug or offended, so he is both and neither at once. On the one hand he rarely makes people laugh, but on the other he isn’t sure whether this would fall into the laughing _at him_ or _with him_ categories he’s heard so much about. It only seems fair he’d be allowed to be socially stranded.

Eventually, he says: “Yeah, well, she’s the one down there now.”

Sobering up, Eric Chapman asks, “You didn’t lock your sister in the morgue, did you?” with a degree of all too real worry in voice.

“No, trust me, Antigone locks herself in the mortuary plenty,” Rudyard says with the resignation of a failed plan bleeding into the sentence. ”I rather wonder what she does down there. Surely operating an automated machine doesn’t consume one’s entire day.”

“Personally, I think we might be better off not knowing.”

“What about you then? Any mainland stories?” Rudyard frowns on the word ’mainland’ like he’s talking about a heap of compost, not that it seems to bother Eric Chapman.

Quite on the contrary, he’s spaced out completely for a few moments. “I didn’t actually run a funeral home over there,” he says.

Rudyard is about to blurt out a confounded, “What?”, when it occurs to him this may be the first time he’s heard Eric Chapman bring up his past – well, beyond the phrase ‘a long time ago’ muttered with that vacant stare that never prompted further question or ever produced any answers. Rudyard has, despite the general consensus on him, paid attention often enough to notice the significance of the change now, and recognises it might be best to exercise what Antigone would refer to as ‘tact’. Doing his best, Rudyard says, “Oh?”

“I worked as an accountant,” Chapman says and, to Rudyard’s confused look, adds, “at a funeral home. That’s where I picked up the trade. It’s not what I actually studied or aspired to or anything, but I’m good at it and the shop here practically runs itself.”

Rudyard almost scoffs at that, because his shop certainly has never ‘run itself’.  What a ridiculous notion. But then Chapman does have that coffee machine. Hell, he’s got an entire cafe. “How on earth did you end up as an undertaker on Piffling Vale from there?”

Chapman shrugs. “I always rather fancied living at the coast and what’s more coastal than an island? There’s coast all around it, and then there was the matter of the antiques shop being leased for a new use. I read about it in a stray copy of Piffling Matters left in a B&B over on the mainland where I was on vacation. Obviously, I had no idea Marjorie was going to murder someone for that lease.” He sighs and looks up at Rudyard. “You know, I’ve never told anyone all this. It’s nice to talk to someone. Most people on the island, although friendly, are so absorbed in their own lives, they never stop to think about others.”

“Yes,” Rudyard echoes. Apart from Madeleine he barely ever speaks to anyone either despite having spent his whole life here. Still, the notion of ever befriending Eric Chapman is ludicrous. If Madeleine were here now, they’d have a good laugh about it.

“It’s such a shame we’ve had to compete against each other,” says Chapman. “I think we could have gotten along quite well, if it weren’t for that. Not that it really would have to be an obstacle, at least I don’t feel that way.”

“Yes, but one can hardly sleep with the competition,” Rudyard says with a chuckle, then, realising his mistake in the phrasing with heat surging into his cheeks, he explains, “In a purely metaphorical sense, of course.”

“Of course,” Chapman agrees and shifts his hands in the coat pockets.

Perhaps Rudyard shouldn’t have given the coat away, after all. The jumper works wonders, but it’s not warm enough and Chapman’s cheeks are colouring with the blood flowing in his re-heating body while Rudyard’s finger are going numb anew. If he’s quite honest, Rudyard is exhausted. Even though he is surprised Eric Chapman doesn’t make for horrid company, he still misses his twenty-year-old, creaky bed, with the dented and admittedly ancient IKEA mattress.

He has to yawn just thinking about it and the world blurs a little at the water gushing into his eyes. Eric Chapman’s figure sways in his field of vision and Rudyard thinks the only reason he won’t sleep is because he doesn’t want to risk accidentally dying, because Antigone might let Chapman hold the funeral out of spite.

“I feel you on a deep, spiritual level,” Chapman murmurs from somewhere beyond, his face only just starting to clear in Rudyard’s vision.

“Sorry _what_?”

“About sleeping, I feel the same. You look like you’re about to keel over and the sentiment is a shared one.” Chapman sits down against the nearest wall and stretches his arms.

It’s gone midnight, which is what Rudyard tells Chapman. “That leaves us with what? Nine more hours.” He’s about to say it isn’t so bad when his stomach gives a sad rumble.

“Guess those digestives weren’t much for dinner.”

“‘Keeps you satisfied for four hours’ I ought to bloody sue them. I’ve supposedly got another eight hours left.”

“I don’t think you can multiply the time by the number of biscuits you eat,” Chapman says. “Wait a minute, did you eat all three in one go?”

“Yes, and it was bloody useless.”

“Well, I knew they wouldn’t be much help, but at least I saved one for a desperate time. There’s also still a granola bar.”

“How very sensible of you,” Rudyard huffs, irritated and cold.

“I don’t know what you’re getting mad at me for,” Eric Chapman says, more on the side of genuinely questioning than annoyed, “I’m happy to share.”

That stops Rudyard dead in his tracks where he’s pacing on the other side of Ms Bosworth’s body, his train of thought completely derailed. “You’d do that?” Eric Chapman nods. “But why?”

“You’re hungry. I have food.”

“Would you give me the coat too if I asked?”

“I’m still a bit chilled, but yeah, if you need it.”

“How are you so _nice_?” Rudyard asks, sounding affronted.

Chapman laughs right in his face. “Are you seriously offended by that? Rudyard, I could just as well ask you why you insist on being an outright twat to people all the time. Now do you want half the granola bar or not?”

Rudyard gives in reluctantly and nods, taking a seat on the icy floor next to Chapman, carefully spaced a safe five inch distance from him as he reaches for the broken off half of a dried out muesli bar. He contemplates the fact that it’s got raisins in it - Rudyard _despises_ raisins -  and wiggles his toes inside his shoes.

At the very least he’s wearing the comfortable ones today, the pair without a hole in the sole, not that he can wear those most of the year anyway. Glancing over at Chapman’s perfectly polished, perfectly black oxfords, even his best pair of shoes seems inadequate with chafe marks all over the sides of the brown leather and an unevenly worn sole. Maybe he’s doomed to never live up to Eric Chapman.

Maybe Funn Funerals will always have slightly more wilted flowers - when they have them at all. Maybe he’ll always be a little too giddy about death for the good of his business. Maybe he’ll never have a coffee machine or a cafe, or irresistible charm or whatever else it is Eric Chapman holds over him, but somehow the fact that not even his shoes can be a match to Chapman’s is more disheartening than any blow he’s received in their entire time as rivals.

“Thank you,” he forces himself to say, “for the granola bar.”

“You’re welcome, Rudyard. Did you want the coat too?”

On this matter Rudyard has made up his mind. “No,” he says and lapses into silence.

Beside him Chapman closes his eyes and Rudyard decides if Chapman is going to fall asleep, Rudyard is going to award the man the courtesy of letting him and be nice for once in his life. He turns his eyes up at the fluorescent lights overhead to count the little squares on the lampshade and try forget how bloody cold he is.

He isn’t sure how much time passes - he counts to 36, then 40, once to 34 - by the time Chapman croaks, “Rudyard, could you please be quiet?”

“I haven’t said a word.”

“Your teeth are clattering incessantly.”

“That hardly counts. I’m cold!”

Chapman hums and, for a moment, says nothing. Then he murmurs: “Listen, I don’t think we’re going to get out of this any other way, so let’s just share the coat.” He cracks an eye open to look at the clock. “There’s still at least eight hours left. At this rate one of us is going to go insane or be seriously ill.”

“Chapman, I don’t know if you slept through this, but we agreed we can’t share that coat.”

“It’s big enough, isn’t it?” Chapman asks, although it’s hardly a question.

“Well, yes, but-”

“Please, Rudyard. Let’s not argue,” Chapman pleads, already unbuttoning the coat.

He slips out of it and hoists himself up high enough to pull it through from underneath himself and drape it over the both of them. “Scoot closer, you git,” he mumbles when the span of the coat falls a little short of their combined width, but ends up making the move himself.

Rudyard freezes for a moment when their flanks are pressed flush against each other. Any hesitation he feels melts away when the heat radiating off Chapman seeps into him and his muscles relax on their own accord. Following Chapman’s example, he slips an arm into the sleeve on his side, left for him and right for Chapman with their respective opposite arms pressed half together. Rudyard sticks his left hand into the coat pocket and curls the other one in his lap, mind zoning in on the tingling sensation of his fingertips coming back to life.

Some minutes later, Eric Chapman does something uncharacteristically indecent for how infuriatingly perfect he is: He starts snoring.

 

* * *

 

Rudyard ends up falling asleep well past one, slipping into strange dreams of dancing corpses and Antigone asking, “Do you think I like gorgeous, handsome men, do you?” gesturing wildly at Ms Bosworth’s cinnamon scented body in Eric Chapman’s morgue. He jerks awake rather frightened by the notion of a musical in _his_ dream only to find he’s exactly in said morgue, but luckily nobody is singing.

The only sound is Chapman’s snoring in uneven grunts, head dropped nearly to his chest so that Rudyard has to wonder whether he’s breathing at all. Before he reaches a conclusion on the matter, he’s drifted off again, streaks of neon light gliding by as his eyelids fall shut.

The second time around he wakes it’s a few hours later, drool slipping down the underside of his chin, and a second hand lying against his thigh. Rudyard turns his head to blink at Chapman, who mumbles something undecipherable in his sleep. He must’ve woken at some point while Rudyard was asleep, his head now safely tipped to the side and his legs folded neatly under the coat to prop him up a good three inches above Rudyard.

Realising his own feet have gone dangerously cold, Rudyard pulls them under the coat too, knees almost folded up to his chest. Eric Chapman’s hand subsequently flops against his stomach with his fingertips brushing against the back of Rudyard’s hand. Still sleep ridden, Rudyard moves it out of the way back to Chapman’s side, but forgets to let go.

He isn’t aware of having fallen asleep again until he moves his head again to find the hands on the clock have crawled into a different position. Apparently Eric Chapman decides to wake at the same time, shifting so their heads accidentally knock together.

“Ow! Jesus, what are you doing?” Rudyard mumbles, snatching his hand from under the coat to rub at his temple.

Chapman, who is even groggier than Rudyard himself, looks at him for a long moment before the words, “Oh, I forgot about you,” tumble from his mouth.

 _Isn’t that just splendid_ , Rudyard muses with a surge of annoyance flooding him. It’s only five and he feels like he’s barely slept at all. The coat isn’t even warm anymore, only damp from the escaped heat that’s left all the moisture trapped in the fabric. The whole situation feels remarkably like the fifth grade camping trip he’d tried and failed to get out of: He’s hungry, thirsty, cold, a little too wet both for his liking and understanding, and most definitely in desperate need of a wee. The only difference is the glare of the lights overhead.

Eric Chapman sighs: “I wish we had some water.”

“If you’re going to start wishing, might as well go for an open door.”

“Rudyard, it’s five in the morning. Is there ever a time when you deign to be pleasant?” Chapman murmurs, letting his head fall back against the wall.

“Oh God, no,” Rudyard says, affronted, “People might get ideas.”

“In what regards? That you’re actually be a decent human being? Afraid someone’s going to want to share a coat again?”

Rudyard stalls, worrying the hem of the borrowed jumper until he realises his elbow is practically jabbed in between two of Chapman’s ribs. “We’re sharing this out of necessity, are we not?” he asks because even the thought of anything else would be ridiculous.

“Yes,” Chapman says and moves just enough to get his legs out from under himself. He stretched them, slipping down the wall, level with Rudyard again, and their shoulders bump together. “Not that it’s working too well.”

Rudyard would agree on that. The only part of his body that still feels a semblance of warmth is the bit of his side pressed up against Eric Chapman. And, he supposes, the hand that’s travelled between his and Chapman’s lap with. He stretches his legs, shoes reappearing from under the hem of the coat.

What a stupid mess he’s gotten himself into. All because he has a bit of a temper. Even more infuriating is the the fact that Eric Chapman is the most insufferably kind human being Rudyard has ever met. He isn’t oblivious or deranged like half the population of Piffling Vale and he isn’t dead or dying and he’s none of the things that drive Rudyard mad or make him sort of happy, and yet he manages to do both at once. Because if Rudyard is honest, the challenge, however draining, is a welcome change to his otherwise boring life, although he has yet to figure out how to channel his anger in constructive ways as his mother always tried to tell him to do.

Rudyard isn’t even really angry anymore. Primarily he’s exhausted, then comes the cold. “I really hope my extremities survive this. Not that I am particularly attached to my toes, but I’d hate to have them amputated from frostbite,” Rudyard says.

“It probably isn’t that bad,” Chapman says. He fumbles around under the coat for something, which Rudyard soon realises is _his_ hand. Chapman touches his fingers, grabs the whole hand, and says, “You seem okay, at least.”

“It’s my toes that are freezing off,” Rudyard says, but doesn’t pull his hand away.

Chapman’s thumb slips to curl in Rudyard’s palm, and Rudyard doesn’t have the slightest clue what that means. He doesn’t look over, or move, or breathe for a moment. Eventually he moves his own thumb, only an inch but enough to rest it atop Chapman’s, wondering if he isn’t horribly misreading everything.

“If it’s any consolation, I doubt we’re going to walk out with any permanent damage. Well, save for the fire extinguisher and the door, but, you know, things could be worse,” Chapman says and frowns at the air in front of him. “For one, we could be dead like Ms Bosworth.”

Rudyard watches her limp hand dangle off the table and thinks of how different his own is. For one, he’s sweating - or then that’s Chapman - but his palm is damp and hot and Rudyard can’t fathom why Chapman won’t let go.

He turns to look at Eric Chapman, who looks back at him, half his hair sleep matted and his eyes flickering over Rudyard’s face. All Rudyard says is: “Your lips are blue.”

A pause. “Are they now?”

“Yes, I really don’t think this is going well-” Rudyard snaps his mouth shut and his eyes dart up to meet Chapman’s.

“Perhaps,” Chapman says slowly, “we should at least try to warm our lips too. For safety reasons. Don’t you think?”

All Rudyard can, in fact, think of is the way he can feel his bloody pupils explode into saucers and the words he’s supposed to say get caught in his throat with the weight of what he’s afraid he’s misjudged. But then he has the sense to nod, fractionally, and Chapman leans toward him, slowly tipping Rudyard off his axis, eyes open and the world spinning.

For all the improbable things that are prone to happening in Piffling Vale, Rudyard would never have thought Eric Chapman kissing him in the morgue would be one of them, but here they are, huddled under the same coat with Chapman’s lips on his and his hand pressing Rudyard’s into the floor.

He breaks away and sucks in a breath, catching the way Chapman’s eyes flutter open to look back at him. For an instant, they are too close for Rudyard to focus on anything on his face. Then Chapman is firmly upright again, saying, “Oh God, how is it only five?”

Part of Rudyard wants to yell at Chapman, because he’s just kissed Rudyard and surely the bloody time of day doesn’t matter, but on the other hand he isn’t too sure this isn’t all some elaborate hallucination his dehydrated brain has conjured. What Rudyard actually does is yawn and say, “Maybe the clock’s broken. What does it matter?”

“Nothing, I suppose,” Chapman says. He tilts his head backwards against the wall to stare up at the ceiling, and Rudyard wonders if he’s also counting the dividers on the lamp shades, but he’s too tired to ask.

He might just as well sleep while he’s at it, Rudyard decides and shuts his eyes. He’s ready to forget half the night, pack it into a bottle to throw out into the sea for someone else to find. He drifts slowly, distantly aware of Chapman’s hand still squeezing his.

 

* * *

 

Rudyard wakes to an immense racket and the lights being turned back on to their full power. His head is throbbing and his jaw has gone slack against something, which turns out to be Eric Chapman’s shoulder.

At the top of the stairs, someone asks: “What on earth?”

Rudyard’s confusion about the unknown voice is interrupted by Chapman unceremoniously getting up, dislodging Rudyard and the coat. “Oh, Helen! Thank goodness you’re here. We... accidentally got locked in here yesterday when I was closing up the shop.”

“Yeah, I found your badge upstairs, but I thought maybe you just dropped it.” Helen - the embalmer, Rudyard’s brain kindly fills in - looks around, eyes darting from the demolished locker and the dinged up fire extinguisher to where Rudyard’s still sitting on the floor yawning. “Were you in here all night?”

“Yes, unfortunately. I hope you don’t mind we broke into your locker for food and the coat.” Chapman gestures first at the wreckage in the corner then Rudyard, who hauls himself to his feet. “This is Rudyard Funn,” Chapman says, “The funeral director of Funn Funerals across the street. Rudyard, Helen, my embalmer.”

Clearing his throat, Rudyard attempts a smile, which, judging by Helen’s expression is a terrible choice. “Nice to meet you,” Rudyard says, still squinting in the glare of the bright lights, “and thank you for the coat.” He thrusts the coat at her and adds: “You’ve done a marvelous job embalming Ms Bosworth, if I may say so.”

“Thank you, I think. Is that my jumper?”

“What? Oh, yeah. Sor-” Rudyard’s voice suddenly goes high and he sneezes twice, bending his head into the crook of the sleeve. “Sorry, I’ll bring it back washed.” He sniffles and breaks out in another yawn.

“I think it’s best if you went home, Rudyard,” Eric Chapman says.

“Yes, indeed, that’s a good idea,” Rudyard agrees. He nods at Helen the embalmer and takes his leave, starting up the stairs.

Behind him he can hear her muttering, “Is he okay?” and Chapman reply with, “Yeah, don’t worry about it.” Rudyard pays them no mind. It’s eight fifty-five, the sun has risen, and he has a shop to open in five minutes. He flexes his ice cold fingers and steps out of the shop into the sunlight.

The square is alive with a new day: Rudyard can smell the morning dew slowly evaporating from the flower pots on the window sills, some child that’s late for school running along the pavement scaring off the pigeons while Mr Hubert stocks the news stand with a new batch of last month’s magazines.

Halfway across the square, Agatha Doyle rides by on her bicycle, ringing the bell at him. “Good morning, Rudyard!”

“Good morning, Agatha.” Above, his shop bell chimes.  


**Author's Note:**

> 1\. Yes, that was a terribly executed joke about cannibalism, in case you're still wondering.  
> 2\. The line about gorgeous handsome men Antigone utters in Rudyard's dream is from episode 1 "The Bane of Rudyard", early in minute 12, and refers to Chapman in both cases.
> 
> You can find me on tumblr at obfuscatress.tumblr.com or on twitter @shippress.


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